CS100 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Sumer, Readwrite, Egyptian Hieroglyphs
10 Oct 2020
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Cs100 lecture 2 - the media of early civilization. Pre writing beginning at 45,000bce: evidence showing that neanderthals and early humans had culture. Alexander marshak: discusses marks on a carved mammoth tooth. These images and symbols vidence of formation of culture as we understand it. Schmandt-besserat: notes we find in the period 15,000 bce artifacts like notched bones and tusks - tallies - as a medium of communication. Tokens: besserat writes that from 8000-32000 bce - counters/markers used to keep track of goods traded, transported, sold, preceded the development of full writing systems, but also led to them, because: 2, 1. Their use immediately precedes the appearance of an ancient writing system in sumeria in 3200 bce: 2. Images of tokens appear as signs in the pictographic alphabets developed by the sumerians: 3. A single token could stand for a large number of items - a capacity for abstraction.
